Favorite TV Show Intros

I started the fifth season of Orange is the New Black yesterday. I've already heard that this season will take place almost exclusively in the immediate aftermath of the prison riot that ended last season, an interesting conceit that has worked out spectularly bad in past (HIMYM's last season), but may just work here. Anyway, I wasn't too excited to start the season - until I heard this.....

Yeah, that is a pretty perfect TV show theme. Unique, memorable, with those flashing haunting close-up of women's faces of all colors and types. It was a perfect entry-point to the show when it started all the way back in 2013, and I'm so happy that they haven't touched it at all in the years since. It got me thinking about my favorite TV show themes and intros. Not just the music, but the accompanying images. Below is just a brief list of my favorites

True Classics:

The Wire 

I love this intro so much. Just like basically everything The Wire did, the intro was close to perfect. The images and quick scenes flashing, few actually taken from the episodes, but each showing themes so central to that season. From the many homages to drugs and 'wires' in Season 1, to ports and foreign passports in Season 2, to government in 3 and schoolkids in 4. Accompanying that was the slightly different take of 'Way Down in the Hole' each year. My personal favorite was Season 3's with The Neville Brothers, or Season 2's redirection to Tom Waits. The intro was just a perfect mashup of imagery and music.


Game of Thrones

There is probably no more famous intro than this one in modern TV history and for good reason. There are a couple just incredible aspects to GoT's intro. First is the music itself, iconic, mesmerizing, brilliant. I truly could hum it for hours on end. Second, of course, is the changing cast of locations the intro would flow past. There are the constants in King's Landing, Winterfell, The Wall, and something over in Essos (though it changed), but the additions of Harrenhall, Dorne, The Twins, Braavos, and so many others over the years. The technology used to create it was perfect. Game of Thrones is one of the few HBO shows over the years to use a cold open, and why not? There is no better entry point into an episode than this.


Arrested Development

Quick, funny, witty. It did well to encapsulate the irreverance of the show to follow it. Ron Howard's narration is the most underrated part of the show, a critical ingredient that made it swim, and it is used well here. One line for each person, giving a quick overview of how each is connected to each other. The show rarely if ever holded your hand except for this, a 10-second lesson and reminder on the relationship each of these bizarrely brilliant characters had with each other.


Personal Favorites:

Bojack Horseman

I fear that Bojack Horseman will never become as popular as it should, lost under the mountain of brilliant content NETFLIX has developed over the years. It really should be more notable, and not least of all because of how perfect that intro is. The dour sound of the music, the laissez-faire way it shows Bojack, the small touches that show the creator's attention to detail (ex: when Todd created his start-up from Bojack's house where the Stripper Orca's ran a cab service, there were Orcas filling Bojack's house when it cut in). It ends so well with a lazy sax over a lazy Bojack lounging in his pool overlooking Hollywoo(d). The depressed nature of the show is its best feature and that starts right at the top.


Silicon Valley




It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia

For 12 seasons, with limited exceptions, Always Sunny has followed the same formula to open a show. Someone says something. It cuts to black. A title card appears with the title itself often being a joke (ex: Dee, "I am not dating a retarded person.".... Title Card: "Sweet Dee Dates a Retarded Person") and then that randomly sweet melody with cut-scenes of famous Philadelphia landmarks. I have no idea why this intro touches me so much. Couple theories; first being how disparate the melody is with the sick nature of the show, and second of how low-grade it looks. Black title card, seemingly self-shot camera footage (particularly in the old non-HD version of the show from like Season 1-4). Overtime Always Sunny lost its full outsider, "we do this on a $500 budget", mindset, and in many ways for the better, but the title sequence always spoke so well to its humble, garage-band beginnings.


Buffy the Vampire Slayer & Veronica Mars

I basically consider these shows together in my mind, as they were built off such similar structures. Their theme songs are different, with Buffy's highlighting the strength of the 'family' its titular character built, with separate moments highlighting each of the Scoobies, and Veronica's mostly showing her and how generally isolated Veronica was, but they were catchy, strong and showcased each shows central character so well. Both shows (moreso Veronica Mars) were built off of the strength of their main leads (SMG and Kristen Bell were born to play these roles), and the action scenes highlighted these. The musical choices were great also - especially Veronica Mars' use of 'We Used to be Friends' a great mantra for the show itself.


Quick Hit Favorites

Shameless

Again, the best intros perfectly encapsulate their show and introduce viewers perfectly. Shameless is so good at this. The rapturous music. The lewd setting. The traipsing of various members of the Gallagher clan entering, using, pilfering and messing up their bathroom. It's barely changed over the years, and it gets me every time.


Nathan For You

I've mostly highlighted shows where the intro scenes and music highlighted what is great about the show. In some cases, it is the dichotomy that makes the intro brilliant. Nathan For You is one of those cases. They've used a memorable Orchestral music often seen in YouTube sports highlight videos to play up the strong, brilliant bonafides of the fake consultant underneath them. The narration is perfect too, no moment better than when Nathan says that he graduated a top school with great grades with a report card shown with perfectly scattered average grades. Even the two examples of his brilliance, changing a shoe display and changing 'And' to 'N'' on a store sign, or so well picked.



Totally Random Shout-Out

Inside the NBA

Let's give a quick shout out to the best pre/post-game show intro in sports out there. The NBA on TNT theme may never match the NBC one (Roundball Rock), but its impressive longevity is coming close. They changed to the current one back in the early-00's, and ever since it has been such a welcome sound every Thursday (and sometimes Monday and nightly in April/May). I still can't imagine a world when Charles, Kenny or Ernie are gone, and this song is such a great intro to that.

Has HBO's Comedy Block Peaked

Yesterday, both Veep and Silicon Valley ended their most recent seasons, their 6th and 4th respectively. Both shows are already solidly within the great comedies of the last 10-20 years, particularly Veep. Both are personally well in my own Top-15 of TV shows, with Veep somewhere in the second half of the Top-10. But both shows ended their seasons on somewhat of an interesting note, resetting themselves after largely their most aimless, softest, least memorable seasons to date. The parallel nature of each this year, splitting the groups into various pieces throughout each season, never going too deep in any one direction, and largely hitting reset in the final episode, all the while slightly underwhelming given their previously great expectations, made me think if both shows are close to running out of steam and if we care too much about plot in comedies in general.

Let's talk about the first point first. Veep built up to the crescendo of Selina being president, a role she assumed late in Season 3 when the President resigned suddenly. It never lost a sense of perspective as Selina went from largely irrelevant VP in Season 1, through candidacy to assuming the top office in the land was commendable. It stayed just as grounded, just as close, and easily just as funny, despite the scope of the issues facing Selina and team getting progressively larger. But when they, at the time I thought smartly, made Selina lose the election (despite spending Season 5 going through interesting machinations to cement this fact) and go into post-presidency, it seemed like an interesting avenue to take. Instead, it led to a hodgepodge of a season with a few interesting sub-plots (Selina's library, Jonah's brief run as renegade rep) mixed in with way too disconnected ones. And now they hit re-set and Season 7, apparently, will be about Selina on the campaign trail again.

Silicon Valley was much of the same. On the whole, the first two seasons built Pied Piper from a small garage-band start-up to a major funded property. Season 3 tore that down to where they lost their primary tech and had to pivot. Season 4 continued this tear down until the Pied Piper team felt ass-backwards into a 9th life and reset the group all together (albeit losing TJ Miller). Now we enter a 5th season basically where the show started, with the gang trying to build Pied Piper into something, with the 'new internet' being basically as obtuse as the original compression algorithm.

Both of these shows were somewhat tired, if for different reasons. For Silicon Valley, it was the feeling that we've seen all this before. The show has always been a bit repetitive with so many episodes being centered around the group nearly losing everything before being saved at the 11th hour, but as we get to the 19th and 20th instance of that particular note, it becomes somewhat stale. Also, to be perfectly honest, the show just wasn't as funny this year. The Gilfoyle vs. Dinesh storylines weren't as sharp. Not having evil genius Gavin Belson and instead fighting-for-his-job Belson was not as fun. There were a few nice highlights, like the continuing rise of Big Head and Laurie's own VC, but on the whole it was just slightly worse.

Same with Veep, which is starting to show some of the pains of when you lose your showrunner and creator. The show was more tired in its insults and character behavior. None of the people on Veep are easy to root for, but it seemed that more of the invictive barbs were more malicious than normal. Then again, here is a show that just finished its 6th season. Few great sitcoms make it this far (admittedly, Veep does just 10 episodes a year), and the few that do that retain their effectiveness are rarely so plot-driven.

The only shows that I think maintained their effectiveness this long into their run as comedies that I've seen come down to two names: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia (12 seasons) and Seinfield (9). Neither show really cared about plot, or at least season-long arcs. Sunny has done this at times, and probably has way more continuity and callbacks to cannon than Seinfield did, but still largely episodes were isolated, characters didn't grow. Sunny was always flatteringly compared to Seinfield. There's a reason why these shows work because when there is no real continuity, it is easier to just focus on jokes instead of plot.

Both Veep and Silicon Valley had focused on season long arcs, and if anything, while Veep struggled without one this past season, Silicon Valley got more aimless because of the presence of one. Silicon Valley really doesn't need a plot or ultimate end goal to work towards. If anything, if the Pied Piper team ever achieves big success, it may lose all relatability (hard to be too relatable if the group has to deal with eight-figures of funding and hiring 50-100 employees). Veep may need that structure back.

Definitely two years back, when Veep was in its 4th season and Silicon Valley its 2nd, I found the hour those two held as far superior than the hour that Game of Thrones had before it (in its 5th season). In reality, I was more looking forward to my hour of comedy than hour of Westeros. Last year they were close to equal, with Game of Thrones maybe taking a slight lead towards the end. The shows were split up this year, and with these two in the rear-view mirror, my yearning for Westerosi plot-driven escapades is greater than ever.

Veep and Silicon Valley have etched their places in my pantheon of great TV shows. Veep will be hard pressed to go any higher than where I mentally have it (somewhere around #7-10). Silicon Valley might with a great finish (showrunner Mike Judge has said he's mentally preparing for 6 seasons). But both won't go higher because they are not impervious to the same ills that have cost so many shows previously. If not for the sheer ability and quantity of talent embedded within each shows' cast, it would be more dire. Instead, the entertainment comes with seeing how the brilliant comedic minds can outdo the writing and plot they're provided.

Nostalgia Diaries, The 2005 Australian Open Classic - Safin def. Federer

I doubt I will go to a game any further back than this one during this little exercise of reliving the past. This one was well in the past. In tennis terms, this was more than a generation ago, when Rafael Nadal had yet to win a single Frech Open, and Novak Djokovic was making his Grand Slam debut. It was an era when behind Roger Federer, the top three players in the world were Andy Roddick, Lleyton Hewitt and Marat Safin, three names that combined for five Grand Slams, losing another eight finals. These were, of course, Federer's true contemporaries, a woebegone bunch who saw Federer make way too much hay in that brief period between Sampras retiring and Nadal rising.

That was the stage when Roger Federer and Marat Safin squared off in the 2005 Australian Open Semifinals. Each with their own interesting backstory heading into that match. For Federer, he ascended in 2004, winning three Grand Slams. The sports really hadn't seen anything like him in a long time. He was so peerless, so excellent, so elegant. At the time, a player winning three slams was unheard of, and cast a shadow in the sport. It was truly a question if anyone would really beat him again. Starting that spring, one man started beating him regularly, and over time he (Nadal) and others would become equally dominant that dominance became the norm. In 2005, it wasn't. It was novelty, it was scary.

Marat Safin was the perfect person to dent that Federer sheen. Marat Safin was undoubtedly the most talented non-Federer player in that little era. Safin had a ludicrously good backhand, a great forehand, a powerful serve. His only real failing was his mind, his inability to stay focused, stay engaged (stay healthy). Marat Safin traipsed his way up and down the rankings, winning a major at 20 by pummeling at-the-time #1 Pete Sampras in the 2000 US Open Final, but also losing a major final to seriously undergunned Thomas Johansson in the 2002 Australian Open final. If anyone could beat Federer, it was Safin. If there was anyone who could but could not be trusted to do it, that was Safin as well.

Turning back the clock 12 years in tennis is an amazing length of time. Roger Federer has always had an ageless look to him, basically looking the same for the last 7-8 years, but rewind to 2005 and he does look different. Longer, flowing hair. A babier face. Federer was just 23, a baby in the sport. Still, he was at his most graceful as well, he seemed to just effortlessly float over the court. Safin had a powerful speed and mastery to him. He himself looked older than his 25. Safin was the opposite of Federer, an 6'4", taut Udonis of a man that oozed sex appeal (yes, I had - and still have - a serious man crush on Marat). The stage was set, under the night sky in Australia. The court was still green at the time, inviting us all in.

The Australian Open always held a special place in my mind because it was an annual event where the timing was so foreign in the US. The day matches started at 8PM. The night matches at 3AM. The night matches would end as I would get-up for school. It was so fun to stay up late on weekends and watch the day session (a 13-year old me was not getting up/staying up at 3AM). The night sessions in Laver are also such enthralling affairs. Unlike the sprawling nature of Arthur Ashe where the noise and energy escapes into the Queens' night sky, in Laver it is all held in, a rapturous, roaring nature that is unseen anywhere else in tennis. The players themselves feed off the energy, heightening any great match into one of unparalleled joy.

The match itself was fairly straightforward through three sets. Federer was getting pushed by Safin more than any player had pushed him in a fair long while, but Federer stood strong in the important moments. Twice, Safin served to force a tiebreak, and twice he was beaten, with Federer winning the first and third sets 7-5 (Safin won the middle one 6-4). At this point, the match was on its axis. It could become a modern classic, with the man who seemed better than anyone had ever been getting pushed further than he ever had, or the final set would be routine after Safin blew his chances. Luckily for us all, including the always great Dick Enberg and Patrick McEnroe calling the match, it was the former, and it was spectacular.

The fourth set featured 12 straight holds, but so many memorable moments in that set alone. You had Safin hitting ludicrous backhands and passing shots. You had Federer whipping forehands. You had chaotic applause from the crowd. You had Marat Safin cursing in Spanish and hitting a ball out of the stadium in protest. You had Federer even smashing a racket after Safin won a long rally with an on-the-run forehand. You actually saw Federer, for once, for the first time seemingly ever, sweat. He was under pressure. He was being tested. The crowd loved it. The announcers loved it.

Given the time difference, ESPN always seemed to have more fun broadcasting the Australian Open, almost as if they thought no one was watching. They zoomed in on a cricket that entered the stadium (Federer pushed it with his racket off the court - Safin would smash and kill it two games later). They randomly played orchestra music between two points. The whole match had this weird energy that added so much to the affair. It would reach its apex during the 4th set tiebreak.

Federer took a 5-2 lead off the back of two clean winners, and one of the most outrageous, outlandish dropshots I've ever seen. Safin clawed back to 5-4 winning two points on Federer's serve off Federer errors, and then, with Safin back in control, Federer did it again. Another absolutely insane dropshot, carved to perfection. All Patrick McEnroe could do is squeal and laugh in enjoyment. Safin wouldn't back donw, and a point later Federer had match point on his racket. For all Safin accomplished, Federer still had the match on his racket. And then Safin pulled off a miracle, two ridiculous shots, a desperation lob, forcing Federer to try a tweener, a good four years before he would actually pull one off. It hit the top of the net. Safin had another life. The won the next two points, stole the tiebreak - and we were a good 70 minutes from the classic ending.

The 5th set played out so perfectly. It would have been cruel for Safin to put in such effort, hit such incredible shots, get the whole crowd on his side ready for a stunning result, to just wilt away. But then again, it would have been so like Safin, someone who made a career of wilting away against far lesser players. But this time he didn't. This time he took control. This time he got the early break, and led the 5th set 5-2. But that's just when Federer showed just how great he is, and how unbeatable he seemed to be in early 2005.

Safin had six different match points but couldn't close it out. Federer broke back, staved off match points to hold a couple times, and we got to the point where it was 8-7 Safin, with Federer serving. At this point it was nearly 1AM, nearly 10AM in the US. It was already a classic, but it had to end in a great way, and it ended with Safin hitting great shot after great shot to finish it. First a clean 2nd-serve return winner. Then a dominant backhand. Then a shot that jammed Federer on the baseline. Finally, on his 8th match point, Safin took the serve early, forced Federer into the corner where he stumbled - supine on the ground he gave up. Safin approached the net, put it away, and raised his arms in exhaustive, muted celebration. It was finally over. No one really knew what to do.

The only one who didn't really seemed stunned was Federer. He knew Safin, he was Safin's friend. He knew how talented this tall Russian was, how great he was capable of being on his night, and more than any other night in his career, this was Safin's night.

Safin would go on to win the Final, beating Aussie favorite Lleyton Hewitt. The tournament was also notable for being both Rafael Nadal's coming out party in a slam, having his own 5-set classic against Hewitt (losing in the 5th), and being Djokovic's maiden slam appearance - he was thrashed by Safin in the 3rd round. As far as Safin goes, he became a trivia fact. From Wimbledon 2004 through Wimbledon 2009 - a good 21 straight slams - only one man not named Federer, Nadal or Djokovic would win a slam. Marat Safin. In fact, it was three years until even Djokovic got his name on that list (the next 11 slams would go Rafa-Fed-Fed-Fed-Rafa-Fed-Fed-Fed-Rafa-Fed-Fed). Marat Safin was the one man not named Nadal who took on a peak, in-form Federer, and actually beat him. The fact it was under a riotous Rod Laver crowd just made it so much the more special.

La Decima

I was 14 years old when Rafael Nadal first won the French Open. I was visiting my Great Aunt in Chicago when it happened. I knew of Nadal, in that I knew of the concept of this long-haired, capri-pant wearing dynamo that took the tennis world by storm leading up to that event. Lest we forget he was already ranked #4 in the world, and the co-favorite heading in with Federer. He beat Federer in the Semifinals. Then beat an overmatched Mariano Puerta to win his first French Open title. At the time, people thought this was the future of clay court tennis. They were wrong. He wasn't the future. He is clay court tennis.

Rafael Nadal now has a perfect 10 French Open titles. Just typing that is wrong. In some ways, this seemed so inevitable when he got #9 three years ago, upping his career total to 14. But since then it also seemed so far away. Nadal lost early at Wimbledon and shut it down for 2014. He made the QFs in 2015 in Australia and Roland Garros, losing in straights each time. The loss to Novak Djokovic in the 2015 French Open Quarterfinals was the changing of the guard, so we thought. It was, for 18 months, but something happened around the time Nadal made a great run to the Semifinals in the Olympics last year. He found his game. And all of that soul searching and stroke searching led him up to these past two weeks.

The best Rafael Nadal ever played was the 2008 French Open, when he won the tournament without a set, capping it off beating Roger Federer 6-1 6-3 6-0 in the Final. Amazingly, nine years later, he had a more dominant run. I would still argue that the '08 vintage of Nadal was more dominant, beating better players with more or less equal domination (he dominated guys that made multiple quarter and semifinal trips with such ease, before beating Djokovic and Federer in three straight), but the 2017 version was incredible in a different way. He was stronger, more offensive, more direct. Nadal in '08 played the best clay court tennis ever. He ran, he defended. He passed Federer so effortlessly in the final from all angles it became almost tough to watch. Nine years later, he is still by far the best clay court player in the world, just doing it in a different way.

Nadal at times seems so robotic in the way he plays. He has his routines he's stuck to with needless obsession for 13 years, from the placement of his water bottle to the shirt and shorts tugging he does prior to each serve. But Nadal the person has become more and more emotional as time went on. Nadal has struggled with injuries off and on since 2009, and these past two years struggled even more openly with confidence. In 2015-16 he blew so many matches the old Nadal would have put away, struggling time and time again to serve out matches. Nadal spoke openly during this time of his struggles with confidence, of his fight to find his game. Always saying how close he was right before another harrowing loss. Somewhere late in 2016 he regained form, and there really was no one who would stop him here.

Nadal's romp through the 2017 French Open was the best kind of inevitable. It was his tournament from the start. With the amount of pre-planned ceremony the French put into the Trophy Celebration, one would think they too thought it was definitely going to be his the second the tournament began. Nadal was so dominant, so effortless. The best match of his to me was his semifinal demolition of Dominic Theim. Here was the guy who played him close twice in Nadal wins earlier in the clay court season and then beat Nadal in Rome. He then beat Djokovic, anhillating the defending champ (who's mysterious decline deserves its own piece), bagelling him in the last set. Nadal matched that domination, bagelling Theim himself.

Rafael Nadal's ten titles did shake the tennis world. Players, rivals even, took to twitter and social media to give Nadal his due - including Federer the man who's respect for Nadal seems to grow day by day (love that he admitted today he wouldn't of touched Nadal had he played the French). It is just such an astounding fact, 13 years in the making. Nadal seemed like a historically great player when he was 17 and beat Federer in 2004. He seemed moreso when he won his first slam as a teenager. Overtime he turned into a contender for GOAT by adapting his game to all surfaces, but his magesterial ability on clay never waned - if anything it improved. 10. Just unbelievable.

The fact we are in 2017, and the best two players on tour this year have been Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal is so heartening for a tennis fan who was lost in a Novak-filled world. One year ago, Novak's slow climb to GOAT seemed inevitable. A year later, the old guard have taken control, and don't seem ready to give it back. A healthy Nadal, emboldened with confidence, is still somewhat in his prime, given how 'prime' is a mysterious concept in today's tennis world. Let's remember he is just a year older than Novak and Andy, younger than Wawrinka. Nadal may not be close to done - and yes this makes his loss to Federer in the Australian Open even all the more painful (it would be 17-16 in slams right now, with Nadal having two career slams), it gives some great energy to the upcoming years.

Rafael Nadal may be done winning. He said in his postmatch interview with John McEnroe that you always wonder if this grand slam win would be last. You can toss that up to the normal Nadal humility that has been such a core facet of his public persona. But right after that he told McEnroe a more hidden, but equally important nugget, that he 'is playing well, and when I play well I will have my chances.' Nadal knows where he is right now, having accomplished a career lifetime achievement of 10 Slams at the French, but he also knows there could be so much more to come. Like his favorite soccer team (Real), winning La Decima was just the beginning - La Undecima and La Duodecima could be right around the corner.